SARANAC LAKE — The village board here has adopted a 10-unit cap to new short-term vacation rentals in Saranac Lake in the coming year, with those 10 units only allowed in certain zones of the municipality.

The 3-2 vote on this policy was debated among the board for a long time with no consensus on Monday, as board members disagreed strongly on how to set requirements for granting exemptions to this cap. Three members want to limit exemptions to people doing rehabilitation or new construction to create their planned STRs. Two members want a wider range of exemption opportunities.

Trustee Sean Ryan feels the policy, as it was passed, is the “greatest disservice” he’s seen on the board since he joined in April because it allows for only two cases for exemption. Mayor Jimmy Williams believes the policy is “illegal” because of discrepancies in its language and the larger STR law it applies to. Both Williams and Ryan voted against passing the policy.

Trustees Kelly Brunette, Matt Scollin and Aurora White, who all voted to pass the policy, do not believe the policy is illegal.

The policy passed Monday states that exemptions to the caps may be granted by the village board “under special circumstances such as new construction and rehabilitation of a derelict or dilapidated building.” The words “such as” are the main point of contention.

Scollin, Brunette and White only want to consider these two cases for exemptions to the cap. Ryan and Williams would like to consider more — mostly in cases centered around financial hardship and maintaining local ownership of homes.

Exemptions are granted by the village board, but an exemption is not an automatic approval of the STR. It just allows the STR application to be heard by the development board, which has its own, separate criteria for approving projects.

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Legality

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When it comes to legality, Williams and village Community Development Director Katrina Glynn had concerns that the policy has conflicting language.

In addition to the “such as” phrase, the policy also states that the board will consider exemptions for projects that meet “one or more” of the listed criteria: new construction, addition, substantial improvement and repair or alteration of an unsafe building. If these are the only criteria the board would consider, Williams says it violates the STR law passed last year, which uses the “such as” language.

Both sides of the debate cited conversations with village Attorney Matt McArdle in their arguments, saying what he told their side confirmed their position. Brunette read an email from McArdle in which he said “I think that the local law should be amended.” Williams and Glynn said when they called the attorney, he told them the policy as it is written was flatly illegal. If the board only considers two types of cases for exemption, they said he told them it would be illegal because of the “such as” phrase.

Discussion over these conflicting statements went nowhere because neither side trusts the other’s method of asking legal questions, or their recounting of verbal conversations.

Williams attempted to table the cap vote, but that motion failed 2-3.

Glynn said they cannot have policy that does not match the law. If board members want to only consider the two stated conditions for exemption written in the law, and no others, she said they would need to change to law to reflect that by removing the phrase “such as.” Changing a law takes time. It requires public notice, a public hearing, a board vote and acceptance by the state. Meanwhile, several locals are waiting for their chance to apply for a new STR permit after more than a year with a moratorium on issuing new permits.

The board tabled a vote on an extension to the STR permit moratorium. Currently, no one is allowed to apply for new STR permits. This moratorium is scheduled to expire on Dec. 31. The policy the board narrowly passed on Monday should make the extension of this moratorium a moot point, but Williams said if the policy is deemed illegal, they might need to make changes to it and might need the moratorium extended slightly to give them time to do that.

The board chose to revisit the extension at its next meeting with a 4-1 vote. White voted against tabling the moratorium extension vote.

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Cap of 10

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The new policy caps the maximum number of new STR permits to be issued in the village in the coming year at 10. With 85 preexisting units, this will set the number of allowable STRs in the village at 95.

Scollin, who co-wrote the policy with Brunette, said they felt 10 is the right number for right now. It’s a conservative number and a starting place.

“We should acknowledge that 10 is a really small number. That means that most people that want to build more STRs will not be happy with the number,” Scollin said. “I, for one, am OK taking that heat.”

Development Board Chair Allie Pelletieri told the board that 10 felt like a good number to him.

Applications for new STR permits will be on a first-come, first-served basis, per district. Glynn has spoken to four people interested in getting new STR permits so far. These people are waiting on the village to make its decision and lift its moratorium.

The policy has a formula for determining which districts can get new STRs. If a district does not already have an STR, or if it has fewer than 50 residential properties, no new STR permits are allowed. Of the village’s 35 districts, half have STRs in them currently.

If a district has between 51 and 200 residential properties, it can have one more STR. If it has more than 200 residential properties, it can have two more STR units.

A chart showing each village district, how many residential properties it has, how many STR units it has and how many new STR permits would be allowed in its boundaries can be found on the meeting agenda at tinyurl.com/4827z3p2 starting on page 13.

Brunette said keeping STRs out of districts that do not currently have them is meant to preserve the character of the neighborhoods and housing stock. In the early years of the STR law discussion, before the affordable housing crisis entered the discussion, neighbor complaints dominated the discussion around the increasing number of STRs.

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Discretion discussion

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The board was split on what sort of cases should be eligible for exemption from the cap.

Williams felt strongly that the board should have the flexibility to assist villagers in need by granting them STR cap exemptions. Instead of what he called a “one-size-fits-all” approach, he wants them to have the ability to use their judgement to grant exemptions for “extenuating circumstances.”

He feels uncomfortable with only having two reasons, saying it limits who can apply for exemptions to only people who can afford to build or renovate a property. He feels it only offers exemptions to developers, and not families who might be trying to get out of a financial hole with another form of income.

Ryan also did not want to remove a tool from the village’s ability to help its residents.

“This limits us greatly,” he said of having just the two exemption possibilities, adding that he felt it was a mistake.

Williams called it “ridiculous.”

“It’s counter to what our responsibility is,” he said.

Brunette said she’s all for helping people, but that the STR law is not the place to do that. To her, the intent of the law is long-term community enhancement through improving the housing stock.

Scollin and Brunette said they could add owner occupied criteria for exemptions in the future if they need to add flexibility. But they said it would be like opening Pandora’s box. If they approve one request and deny another, it would leave people angry.

“I’m having a hard time (with) when do we tell someone ‘yes’ and when do we tell someone ‘no?'” Brunette said.

Pelletieri said he struggles with the same thing on the development board. They use judgement on things like variances all the time and it’s a judgement call.

Williams said they can’t exactly create a rubric.

“You can’t put a number on financial hardship,” he said.

Development Board member Rick Weber said every decision the village board makes would become a data point in the record they could build on to refer to in future decisions — staking out the boundaries of the policy over time.

Williams said they were elected to make decisions. Brunette said she wants to be consistent and worried about who will makes these judgement calls in the future.

Glynn said the village board was creating a process where it had to make decisions like the development board and wondered if they could give the responsibility to that other board. Brunette said the trustees wanted to make these decisions because they’re elected officials and the development board is made up of volunteers.

Glynn and Pelletieri both agreed with Williams and Ryan. Their belief is that the village should be open to considering more types of exemption cases. Pelletieri called the policy as passed “pro-development.”

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Other STR details

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The STR law is entering its second phase after the village registered 85 preexisting STR units — allowing them to continue uninterrupted before stricter residency requirements and maximum permit caps take effect. These 85 properties account for 116 units, representing 254 bedrooms and a total of 606 occupants.

Preexisting STR owners are currently being asked to renew their licenses. The window for these renewals lasts through Jan. 31.

If an STR permit is not renewed at some point, the village could refill it, or reduce the total number of STR units in the village by one. This total number will be assessed annually.

Scollin said he would not want to refill empty slots. Brunette felt they should pace themselves with allowing new STRs. She wants to pull back the number of STRs in Saranac Lake over time.

Williams wondered if they wanted to allow more new STR units downtown. Right now, most are in residential areas. Scollin and Brunette said they want to keep STRs in areas where the most residences are — to keep STR density low and to preserve a diversity of housing options for different income levels and lifestyles.

“Yeah, it comes at the expense of STR expansion, but I think that seems to be the decision the board has made,” Scollin said.

A village report earlier his year found that STRs make up around 5.3% of the village residential housing stock — which is made of 1,527 properties.

There will be fees for obtaining a new STR permit, with sharply increasing rates for larger and larger operations — ranging from $25 to $1,600.

At this time, anyone renting out a property as an STR without one of those preexisting permits would be in violation of the village law and subject to fines — $500 per day of violation.

The village currently counts 27 active, unlicensed STRs. These units may not all be violating the law because an “active” unit might not actually be renting stays and violating the law. It could just have a profile on an STR platform but have no open bookings at this time.

Glynn plans to send letters to the owners of these properties, give them a time frame to remove the listings and start issuing fines, if they do not.

The majority of existing STRs are second homes. Half of these second homes are owned by Saranac Lake residents. A quarter are owned by New York state residents and another quarter are owned by out-of-state residents.